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Has anyone forgone sentinel node biopsies?
Breast Cancer | Last Active: 2 days ago | Replies (21)Comment receiving replies
Putting this into perspective of time. 40 years ago, they were still doing radical or Halstead mastectomies, 30 years ago many women still got mastectomies, 20 years ago many women still got chemo AND radiation, 10 years ago I noticed a real shift to do the lumpectomy check the sentinel nodes and if they were clear ……. watch and wait. Since my family has seen breast cancer during all of this time and my own dx 20 years ago, I have enjoyed watching the progression.
I am grateful to you @cmce and @reflector75 for leading the way for yet another shift to less aggressive treatments. Give yourselves a bow for your courage to do this even though it is scary.
Where do you think we might we go in the future? How will you celebrate helping to move to care forward?
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@auntieoakley This was my line of thinking, too. Progress can be scary, especially being among the first group to go along with new research. Breast cancer treatments were radical in the past. Changes such as this one are meant to provide women with the least amount of invasive surgery while providing the same excellent hope for success. My hopes are high, and like @reflector75 said, avoiding complications that may arise with node biopsies seems like a good choice, given the givens.
It is hard to think past the surgery at this time. I want to wait until that is over and the Oncotype results are in. I am most afraid of those results, but keeping my hopes high as this was found early, and it is early stage IDC.